The successful manager concentrates on developing strengths of his team members - not trying to correct their weaknesses. Sometimes you have to manage around a weakness, but you can't make people what they're not.

Some years ago I decided to improve my golf by taking some lessons. A friend and I spent some hours with a professional golfer and coach at a local country club. This was really useful to me and I did get better. However my friend Robin hadn't a clue. No matter what pro told him to do, how to change his stance and his grip, he could hardly hit ball.

If you'd given Robin a hundred lessons and threatened him with a gun, I doubt if he'd ever have completed a round of golf in less than two days. Robin is a successful lawyer and makes a lot of money, however a golfer - he is not.

So if you have a sales person on your team who isn't bringing in sales or a production engineer who isn't making his quota, then you have to make a decision. Is this person not producing because they don't have ability - because they need more training or - because there's another reason?

You can read more about coaching and other reasons for non performance in my book - "How to get more Sales by Motivating your Team" but for moment it's important to understand that individual may not be able to do job.

They may tell you they can do job because they're unwilling to accept defeat; however I've known people in sales jobs who shouldn't be in sales and doctors, plumbers, lawyers and engineers who were also in wrong job.

I've also heard managers say - "I sit with my team in an open-plan office so I'm always available to them and I hear what's going on" - OH NO YOU DON'T!

It's important to get out of your office or up off your seat and mix with your people on a regular basis, don't wait for them to come to you. Pull up a chair and have chat and don't just talk about business, find out how they're doing on a human level. That doesn't mean prying into their personal life, but your team members want to feel that you're interested and care about them as a person.

It's also important that they feel free to chat amongst themselves so don't stifle that. A team who have good relationships with each other are a productive team.

Many business owners and managers aren't comfortable about speaking to their team members unless it's about business. I've worked for many managers who knew nothing or very little about me on a personal basis.